Ask the Architect

I need an architect even for a deck?

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Q. Our deck was built 30 years ago by my husband and a contractor/friend. Now we’re getting ready to sell, and changed the handrails and replaced some boards, but when we did this, an inspector showed up and gave us a “notice of violation.” After all these years, we didn’t know a deck needs a permit, and thought that after so long it should be grandfathered in anyway, right? Then the inspector told us our handrails were too tall and had openings that were too big. Ugh! Shouldn’t there be some rule, like squatters’ rights, that if it’s there for so long, it’s just accepted? He also told us we need metal connectors, and that an architect could help us. Why do we need an architect, and what is all this nonsense about? We just want to sell our house.

A. Nobody ever told me in architecture school that decks were something I would need to know anything about. We were being trained for big buildings and large civic structures like police stations and courthouses. Decks? If they’d told me I would become a suburban architect answering questions about decks and designing homes, I may have reconsidered, but 36 years later, and mostly because I wanted to see my kids grow up, I had to take a closer look at decks, pools and other smaller projects more seriously, and so should you.

It doesn’t happen often, but people die in deck accidents, from collapses, when a hot barbecue pinned a man down and burned him to death, or when small children get just their head through a railing and hang themselves. Graphic as this is, the potential for winds or water ripping your deck and sending it hurtling through someone else’s home is also very real, as when sections of a supposedly invincible boardwalk end up blocks away. You can tune in any day of the week and see what nature has randomly done to our charming living quarters, and the amount of money and effort spent to rescue people, so, understandably, there have been many rules adopted to protect us from one another’s follies.

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